One
of the standard rejection letters from agents reminds the unlucky recipient
that writing is a highly subjective thing and just because one agent doesn’t
like your novel does not mean that it’s crap.
Although after forty rejections I
begin to wonder. Recently, though, I got a lesson in this thing called subjectivity.
I have a neighbor, a non-writer, who is nonetheless well-read. Each weekday she commutes via public transportation into Los Angeles—an hour each way—so she has lots of time to read. I encountered her a few days ago on my way back from the pool and she saw, from the book I was carrying, that I had just start reading Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier.
“Good luck,” she said. “It took me a year to get through that book. I kept asking myself, ‘Why do care about these people?’”
Funny, because that was my thought about the last novel she gave me—by another bestselling author. I dragged my way through it. It was so boring I even can’t tell you how it ended
The truth about Cold Mountain, though, is that I can’t put it down. Perhaps it is because I read Team of Rivals and Gone With the Wind earlier this year and I am familiar enough with the Civil War to know what is going on. I find it riveting. Added to that, I know there is a story about the marketing of Cold Mountain. I have heard snippets of it and I want to find out more.
But the experience is a lesson in subjectivity. Different folks like different books. The thing is we are not that different, my neighbor and I. Both about the same age, raised in Southern California. We have different tastes, though.
Maybe there is something to that agent rejection letter that cites subjectivity.
See ya’ later.
WhatIfYouCouldNotFail.com by Tim Sunderland is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Comments